Macromedia aligns with Eclipse

In a bid to get Java developers writing Flash applications, Macromedia is throwing its weight behind the Eclipse programming system.

Google vs Yahoo

An interesting flash tool that compares the search results of Google and Yahoo for a particular term...

Laszlo Training Event

Laszlo is putting up a introductory training course for the LPS on Dec. 2nd and 3rd in San Francisco. At $1600, it may seem a bit steep for an introductory course, but a look at the agenda suggests this is not one for absolute beginners. Should be worth the price, I reckon...

Now showing at Amazon Theatre

Amazon has just started a series of Flash based short films that are being shown on their site

Produced by Fallon the quality is slick and the idea is for people to buy the products placed in the films.

Unfortunately, for me, the credits kept popping before the whole movie was over... annoying...

But interesting...

Flex is free. And Laszlo is Open Source

In back-to-back announcements, Macromedia announced that Flex is available free for non-commercial applications and Laszlo announced that LPS is now open source. So things are becoming pretty difficult to choose between.

I think I would go for Laszlo...

Flash gaining acceptance?

I was just going through this post on Jonas' bolg and the InfoWorld article it touches upon has some really interesting statistics. The article is study on what developers are working on these days, and while ActionScript does not figure amongst the top used programming languages (though ECMAScript does), around 45% people mentioned that they will be increasing the use of Flash in their work. Now that is as good a sign as it can get...

RoboDemo is now Captivate

The new version of RoboDemo (...sorry Captivate) looks cool. One of my biggest feature request with RoboDemo was the need for a timeline based edit of the screens, looks like Captivate takes care of that. This would be a must have upgrade if you use RoboDemo...

Flashtival 2004

The fourth edition of Flashtival 2004, the largest Flash and Webdesign conference of the Benelux takes place on Monday 27th September. The program focuses on the international character of the conference and a number of the most well-known Flash professionals from all over the world will be present. Flashtival 2004 takes place at Congress Centre De Doelen in Rotterdam, Holland.

For more info visit the Flashtival site

BayCHI Panel on RIAs

Good to see RIAs getting some focus in the CHI community. If you're in the Bay Area around Aug. 10th this should be an interesting discussion to attend. And looks like Rashmi is chairing this panel...

Flash Lite supports SVG-T

So Flash Lite supports SVG-T and according to this article the SVG-T support was a direct request from its European customers and is part of the 3GPP standard. But as Russell Beattie was asking a long time ago, does it support Web Services?

BEA Alchemy

BEA Alchemy is an IE (browser) plugin that is being developed as a way to deliver rich data to thin clients and also help them work in an 'Occasionally Connected' mode. Jon Udell in this article says:

“The caching scheme is the heart and soul of Alchemy. Current approaches to taking browsers offline typically queue messages that later update in a server-based data model. An Alchemy application, though, always works with a genuine local data model that it stores as sets of XML fragments and navigates in a relational style. Bosworth’s hunch is that a Web-style thin client, driven by a rich data model intelligently synchronized with the services cloud, could do most of what we really need — both offline and online. ”

Looks like Alchemy in combination with Liquid Data is going to give Macromedia Central and Flex a run for their money....

Client Side XML Rendering of UIs

XML based definition of the UI in nothing new, but the problem is that there is no standard. There's XAML, XUL, WSUI and now even MXML...

Well according to this demo by Nik Khilnani of Funciton it is theoretically possible for the Flash to render the MXML on the client. Deng of course used to render XHTML and XFORMS but I've not heard anything about the project lately.

It would also be much faster to build applications using XML based UI definitions (I'm sure there would be those who disagree) and it may be a worthwhile exercise to explore if Flash really can be the rendering engine of choice...

Of course, ubiquity is what really what makes Flash an attractive proposition. 'Cause otherwise, there are already so many options available already (as the XUL aficionados will surely point out)

Macromedia Flexes its muscles.

Macromedia’s server-side products have never quite enjoyed the same kind of success that it’s desktop applications have (the exception being Cold Fusion, but then it was already quite successful before it became a part of the Macromedia stable.)

So with the release of Macromedia Flex, is this equation going to change?

Not sure.

Firstly, there is a very similar product in Laszlo Presentation Server that has been around for a while. But despite its potential, I’m not sure if Laszlo has made quite the impact it was hoping to. Flex is definitely has a advantage in Brady (the MXML editor) but the real challenge for application developers would be to justify the cost of an additional application server just to render the UI which in turn requires a plugin on the client.

Somehow, I’m finding this a little difficult to justify. Had the same problem justifying Generator development about four years ago. But then that was the dot.com boom time, and funding an ambitious online application was slightly easier than it is now. So the question is, will Flex go the Generator way?

The Singhsons

Absolutely, positively, awesome...

Found this via moik78 and I really had a nice laugh. Can;t stop even now... :D

Macromedia India Presents FlashClash

FlashClash is India's biggest-ever Macromedia Flash contest for designers and developers. Here's your chance to show off your creativity in Flash and take away cash and other hot prizes worth more than Rs.340,000. For more details check out the FlashClash site.

Macromedia VS WebEX

Right when Macromedia announced a month of free access to Breeze I received an invitation to try out WebEX for two week. Absolutely free. Looks like there a small bit of competition bashing going on here...

We use WebEX at work (and it has worked well so far) so there was no point in going for the free trial, but I have asked the sales team to try out Breeze, lets see what their verdict is...

MAX India

Brajeshwar points to the Macromedia MAX 2004 conference which will be held in Bangalore and Delhi. Nice to see India getting on the conference map, though my only peeve is that the Singapore event is a two day thingy and I'll particularly miss the 'Enterprise Application Technology' track...

Anyways, things usually begin slowly, and any beginning is good, right? ;)

The next version of the Windows OS...

...is now a very funny flash animation.

Work for more than 2 years to pay for Studio MX2004

Most people who come to my site looking for a Flash Crack (there is none on this site) leave behind comments that they are unable to afford the software. Now, sinc1968 has posted an RIA that looks at the cost of the software when compared to the GDPs of various countries, and apparently for somebody in Vietnam to purchase Studio MX2004, they would have to work for more than two years (and spend no money on food and other necessities) It's always a challenge with the pricing game for developing countries, and can't one work out a pricing/licensing model that is country specific, and use the IP address to detect the country they are using the software from, and disable access outside the country? I know, it sounds ridiculous, but if the price is right, I don't think people would mind it...

Mazda Transformers

Mazda USA has a cool Flash Site for the 2004 Autoshow. Check out this transformer animation that is part of the site...

Instant Karma (or Kama?)

Souldn't this be Instant Kama as Kama Shastra (Kamasutra) is the ancient India doctrines on love making. Any way, this is an interesting execution in Flash none the less...

[Via Metafilter]

Longhorn Demo

Scoble points out to a Longhorn Demo that takes you through a sample Real Estate Application using Avalon (the vector based renderer) Indigo (reliable Messaging) and a host of other web services which form the basis of the Service Oriented Architecture behind longhorn. All this is quite exciting in terms of technology, but it is introducing the same kind of challenges that Flash had during its early days with respect to consistent user interfaces. The zoomable map using a magnifying glass that enlarges the area underneath it, reminded me of so much of the early Flash days, when such effects were considred cool. Avalon might go though a similar phase where developers will be so much in awe of what is possible that they might go ahead a design interfaces without actually thinking whether the interfaces are actually usable. By the way, couldn't the Linux/J2EE group use a combination of Flash and Webservices (read Central) to achieve what Longhorn is aiming to do without having to re-write anything?

Jack Zerby learnt about web design from his parents.

So what did he learn? Well five things to begin with:

• Ditch the intro
• Big enough buttons
• No Stupid web forms
• Make it fast loading (can't say his own site loads quickly though...)
• Keep it simple

I think this is a simple but great portifolio site, that has attitude and good design. Good work Jack...

Graffiti Archeaology

MetaFilter: Graffiti Archeaology
Graffiti Archaeology Pretty cool flash app that lets you view photos of the same walls in San Francisco over time, as the many layers of graffiti accumulate. To anyone that has ever ridden the Caltrain, a lot of these walls should look familiar.
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Six year old Flash genius?

Just got this email via my site. Check it out:

Name of sender: adarsh rao

Message: Hi, I am Adarsh Rao (6 years old)studing in 2nd class, vidya vinayalaya school, Hyderabad. I have learned 8 softwares, they are Adobe products like Illustrator10.0, Photoshop 6.0, Flash5, Flash MX, Premier 6.0, Sound forge 4.5, Macromedia, Director8.0, Kinetic 3D Max studio 4.0, Morphing. I am certified in Flah designing & computer Graphics and animation with 94% and 3D Max from institue of Image Malakpet branch, Hyderabad. I made my website www.adarshrao.com and my school website www.vidyavinayalaya.com and has done several small projects.

I want to appear Macromedia Flash MX Designer Exam in December 2003.

I have alredy studied Flash MX bible and Christopher Hayes Flash MX Designer study guide. I have given practice test on www.forta.com several times. if you can, please mail sites for free practice test and any other books to appear
Macromedia Flash MX Designer Exam.

thanking u
adarsh rao
xxxx@rediffmail.com

I personally have not been preparing for certification, but a lot of you guys might have. Want to give pointers to this youg chap? Let me know. I don't want to put the email up (harvesting), but if anybody wants to encourage him, ping me and I'll send it across...

Stories of Krishna

The Seattle Art Museum has a nice Flash piece on the life of Krishna. The presentation uses the Indian Miniature style of paintings that give a superb texture to the entire piece. Looks really good. Also, check out the original Indian accent on the voice-over...

Shipping the prototype

Came across this old article by Jon Udell on Infoworld, that calls to elevate scripting languages like ActionScript, JavaScript and Python to a more respectful level.

“I am not only saying that you can do what used to be called "systems programming" in what used to be called a "scripting language" -- although you sometimes can. Nor am I merely lauding Python as a spectacular implementation of a first-class scripting language -- although it is one. My point is that languages like Python, but also Perl, Ruby, and JavaScript/JScript/ActionScript/EcmaScript, are strategic in ways that we don't yet fully acknowledge.”

I do agree they really do deserve more importance in the development process but the idea of using prototypes as final products does seem a bit too revolutionary.

They are very useful if used in pilot studies, and should be built in such a way that most of it can be leveraged. It still may not be possible with current development tools, but it would be great to have one like that. Develop in a scripting language and deploy in Java/C++.

Napster's Flash "Street" ad campaign

Boing Boing Blog: Napster's Flash "Street" ad campaign
Napster Bad -- not. This series of flash shorts on the Napster.com site seem to be a sort of animated equivalent to the faux graffitti ad campaign. Both the posters and the shorts cast that be-headphoned mascot as a hunted rebel The Man just won't leave alone. Sure, it may smell like teen spirit -- but Old Napster it ain't, despite the conspicuous attempts at street cred. Link
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512KB has a 5MB Flash Animation

num1000remix is smooth, high paced animation that looks quite cool. There are quite a few neat tricks there, which make it look quite slick. However looking at it, I can’t but help think, could this not have been achieved in less than 5MB? Maybe it’s the high quality audio, but still…

It's been ages since I've done animation myself, but the old school flash animators were so keen on keeping file sizes down. Is it no longer a prerogative?

Bosworth on occasionally connected computing

Adam Bosworth explores the various ways in which occasionally connected devices and programs can work while delivering an agreeable user experience.

“Let's start with a simple case that drives me crazy. As many know, I use and love a Blackberry 7210 for most of my work. I literally don't use a PC sometimes for days on end right now. Mail is a joy. The phone works well for me (I carry a backup for the vast majority of the US that ATT Wireless seems unable to reach), my calender works well. Only my contacts don't synch wirelessly (come on Blackberry!). But browsing isn't fun at all. I like to keep an eye on google's news. And navigating through it using the 7210 is really painful even when GPRS is humming and downright impossible on planes or, as it turns out, in Bedford NY when ATT wireless is your provider. So, I'd like my Blackberry to have google in the cache. Now if anything should be easy it is this. It is a nice simple hierarchy with subjects like Sports, Sci/Tech, ... and a set of stories. But there are a couple of complications. The stories aren't laid out at all well for a mobile device. Menus seem to go on forever. I don't care about sports. Yes, I know, that's un-American. Nor do I care about entertainment. What would the web services browser do?”

I think there are loads of good ideas there for building Central applications. Also I think Central should be available for PDAs as well as this is where occasionally connected computing really comes in handy...

PS: He asks where do expert bloggers find the time to keep posting daily...
Frankly, I've no idea ;)

Flash and Enterprise Applications

I'll be watching this closely as Sean Viosen is currently working with a team building an enterprise level application in Flash. At my company, I've had the opportunity to decide upon the technology to go with and decided to stick to a traditional HTML/CSS UI. You can call it chickening out/prudence or just simply a measure of the paucity of good Flash Developers (I don't want to be the only developer on an Enterprise level application!!) I sure do hope Sean blogs about the progress of his company. I would certainly like to know...

Rich UI. Is it really worth the hype?

Jon Udell looks at what the implication of getting richer UIs on applications means. He talks about his user experience with Windows 2003 as an example

<quote>

Most of my interaction with the software [Windows 2003] was dominated by two user-interface idioms: trees and tabs. The trees are, of course, the ubiquitous tree controls that manage hierarchies of servers, users, registry keys, and every other kind of object. The tabs are dialog boxes. These are both good and useful constructs, but as a strategy for managing complexity, they haven't evolved. Meanwhile, the Windows server products have gotten much more complex. Adding more snap-ins to the MMC (Microsoft Management Console), thus multiplying the trees and tabs, can't be the only way forward.

Jon is right to some extent. We desperately need to simplify the interactions. This would call for newer UI paradigms. Some that are much simpler and can effectively display information and expose functionalities. Jon gives Sam’s Fisheye Menu as an example. The disadvantage of introducing new interactions for existing functionality is that people need time to get used to them. And the best way to get used to them is if the interactions are present in the OS itself. Apple has been leading the way on this front. I and certainly wish for Apple to separate the OS and the hardware or at least, there should be an alternative to the MS OS (I know, I know, Linux) that can really lead the way with pioneering interaction design.

Color Scheme Generator

A nice site that gives you a tool to generate color schemes and even see how the colors will appear to visually challenged people. There is also a Flash version that I'd blogged about some time back but this is much better...

It's a Flash Animation about some monkey business

Researchers at Duke U are doing some interesting experiments with neural interfaces and monkeys:

Quote:
"Monkeys can control a robot arm as naturally as their own limbs using only brain signals, a pioneering experiment has shown. The macaque monkeys could reach and grasp with the same precision as their own hand"

[via Boing Boing]

Flash and Infopath vs Mozilla

Jon Udell at InfoWorld has this interesting article that looks at the pros and cons within Flash, Infopath and Mozilla as platforms for developing Internet Applications. Jon tends to feel Mozilla offers a lot strategically. I tend to agree with Jon. XUL is truly cool and Mozilla Firebird is a great browser, but as long as it does not catch on, I believe Flash is the strongest contender for RIAs

Get your own Tabloid Cover designed

Just found this silly Flash thingy via Boing Boing. Get a gossip magazine cover up in no time...

Cooking with ActionScript, Part 2

O'Reilly Network Articles: Cooking with ActionScript, Part 2
This week we conclude our two-part series of excerpts from ActionScript Cookbook with sample recipes on pausing and resuming a sound, saving a local shared object, and searching XML.
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Lynch on Central

Kevin Lynch is blogging after a long time and this time it is about Central. Nothing new there if you've been following other Flash blogs...

Cooking with ActionScript

O'Reilly Network Articles: Cooking with ActionScript
We've a diverse slate this week of recipes for ActionScript developers from the recently released ActionScript Cookbook: Our first is on formatting currency amounts; the second on using a unique depth when creating a new movie clip; and the third on creating timers and clocks. And check back to this space next week for recipes on pausing and resuming a sound, saving a local shared object; and searching XML.
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Making Rich Web Application Architecture Usable

Vishi has an article on Sitepoint. Good pointers and makes a nice read...

Disabling right click context menu in the Flash Player

Greg Wygonik has a tutorial for this here.

You can see it in action here. Will work for IE/PC and Firebird/Mozilla 1.3.

Macromedia Central goes Public Beta

aSH notes that the Mocromedia Central Public beta is out...

Macromedia Royale soon to go Beta

Just received an email saying that the Macromedia Royale initiative will soon go Beta. You can sign up here for more info on it or check out the FAQs here.

There is also talk about a visual layouting IDE (codenamed Brady) that will work with Royale. I thought Royale was for coders. Why would they add such an element into Royale. Isn't Flash good enough for that? Maybe this is built using JSFL, if so it makes a lot of sense...

Top 25 Innovators

CRN Magazine's list of top 25 innovators...

Macromedia's Kevin Lynch figures at number 9...

Quote:

His latest project is Central, technology that will create a new Internet environment for applications based on Flash, which is probably Macromedia's most widely used contribution to the Web world. Lynch says Central will act as a container for centralizing data from multiple sources,offline and inline,displaying or acting on it according to a user's preferences.

Quoting Lynch:

"It [Central] will unite applications in ways that developers didn't anticipate,"

Macromedia Central: Latest Developments

Oscar Trelles points to the latest Macromedia Central screen shot.

Meanwhile Mike Chambers has an article up on DevNet that gives you the latest update.

Looks like all the blogging about the lack of updates about Central got the MM PR machinery running after all ;)

.Net? Java? Flash!?

JD on MX: .Net? Java? Flash!?
.NET? Java? Flash!? An article at InternetWeek discusses how one project decided on the technology to complete a project. It has a catchy title (".Net? Java? No Thanks, We'll Take Macromedia Instead"), and I know lots of people are happy...
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Ten Tips for Building a Flash Remoting Application

Flash Remoting has not changed much for the release of Flash MX 2004, which is good news for programmers building complex Rich Internet Applications (RIA). Flash Remoting still offers the most flexible, intuitive way to add an application server to your RIA. Tom Muck, author of O'Reilly's upcoming Flash Remoting: The Definitive Guide, offers ten tips for building a Flash Remoting application that will help programmers deliver the most efficient RIA possible.

Flash JavaScript API Documentation

mizubitchy has a short descrition of the Flash JavaScript API language elements...

And a script that parses the xml file.

Can Lotus Notes R3 save the browser and Flash Plugin?

Ray Ozzie of the Lotus Notes and Groove fame has put up an example of what he believes is prior art to the Eolas patent. Meaning that, since Lotus Notes, a commercially available program was able to perform all of the functions mentioned in the patent well before the patent was awarded, the patent should be invalidated...

Can this save the browser yet?

[via Slashdot]

Does this mean the end of Flash plugin as we know it?

I've mentioned this before [1  2  3], the US software patent laws are quite unjust and open for a lot of (mis)interpretations...

M$ is getting badly beaten up on the Eolas case and for once you actually feel sorry for them!

People are already looking for the Flash MX2004 Crack

I was looking at my referral logs and it seems that a search on Google for the term leads people straight to my site.

No crack here buddies, but while you're here looking for it, why don't you drop by the Macromedia Store and buy the real thing. It's worth it...

Dave Yang has released a Class Browser for Flash MX2004

Cool, now you browse all your external AS classes from the Flash MX2004 Project Panel using the Class Browser...

BTW Dave, welcome to blogging...

Browserhawk Flash stats

JD on MX
Browserhawk Flash stats: This page came up on one of the lists today, with the implied question of "Why are these numbers different from the NPD version stats?" The only methodology I see offhand is on their reports page, which...
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Jef Raskin has a ZUI demo built in Flash

Jef Raskin (The Humane Interface, Mac fame) has a Flash Demo of a ZUI (Zoomable User Interface.) It's an 8MB Flash file so it takes a while to load. There are also some performance issues with the demo, but it gives you a fair idea...

Jef, understandably, did not have all insights into the Flash development process and mentions that he could not get Flash to recognize the left mouse click. He should have come here first...

But nevertheless it's great to see Flash being used as a prototyping tool. I think it serves the purpose extremely well...

Allaire: Blogging from the Baltic Sea

Quote:

"I'm just finishing a family vacation on the baltic sea, and am happy to report that the cruise ship has broadband wireless internet delivered via satellite, and Wi-Fi throughout the public areas of the vessel. Also of note is that the entire "shell" for using computers in the Internet Cafe is built with Flash, and they offer a Flash Communication Server-based video mail app for communicating with your friends and family on the mainland. Internet 2.0 trends following us everywhere..."

CNET Profiles Royale

CNET has an article on Macromedia's Royle initiative:

Quote: Macromedia is in the middle of an ambitious effort to expand the use of Flash--once seen mainly as a format for blinking Web ads--into a broad foundation for delivering Internet applications and building interactive Web sites. The company earlier this year released new tools aimed at creating Flash applications that don't depend on a Web browser and recently announced Flash MX Professional 2004, a set of Flash development tools with an interface designed for mainstream programmers familiar with environments such as Visual Basic.

What is SharpFlash?

If you have been wondering like me, here's some information:

"SharpFlash is a third-party tool (released under the GNU General Public License) allowing Flash applications to have more power on operating systems supporting the .NET Framework. It exposes (read: in the future, it will expose) an ActionScript API allowing a Flash application to have as much control over the environment as a native desktop application has. This includes things like allowing file access (both read/write), registry access, internet access, etc."

For more information, check the documentation here or the sourceforge project page for SharpFlash

Also check out Darron Schall's initial post on SharpFlash

Buy one copy of Flash, get one free - Conditions Apply

Dave at ActionScript.com looks into the new Flash MX2004 EULA and points out what he thinks are chinks in the Product Activation/EULA armor. Not sure if I agree with it entirely, but some points are quite valid...

Scoble points out that xbox.com is using flash...

Robert Scoble at Microsoft points out that xbox.com is using Flash...

Unit testing ActionScript 2.0

Alistair McLeod at iteration::two made a post on FlashCoders announcing the intention to release AS2Unit, a framework for unit testing ActionScript 2.0. Here's the complete post...

Quote: A recent discussion on unit testing Actionscript 2 classes on this list has prompted this announcement.

We are pleased to announce that the development team at iteration::two have
developed AS2Unit, a testing framework for Actionscript 2, which will be
released as an open-source project to the Flash community when Flash MX 2004
is released.


What is AS2Unit?
----------------
Based on the xUnit framework, AS2Unit allows Actionscript 2 developers to to
create and run repeatable tests. Developers can test their Actionscript 2
classes independently of their on-stage components.

AS2Unit promotes test-first design, improving the maintainability of your
Actionscript 2 classes. As tests and test suites are added to your system,
you will build up a set of regression tests for your application, allowing
you to remove the fear of refactoring your code. New features can be added
to your system in confidence that your tests will catch any changes that
conflict with your existing logic.

Your Actionscript 2 classes can be tested independently of your creative
design, allowing multiple concurrent threads of development. This results in
drastically reduced levels of problems arising during the integration of
your system components.

AS2Unit works in harmony with your source control software to allow
continuous integration of your codebase. Multiple developers can develop and
maintain the the same codebase, confident that the test suite will identify
any conflicts.

AS2Unit allows the creation of tests, test suites and provides setUp and
tearDown functionality to create and tidy up data for your tests. It also
provides a full framework, to allow developers to add their own additions to
the package.

The source of AS2Unit provides good examples of many of the new features
available in Actionscript 2, as it is a full Object Oriented implementation,
using class hierarchies and interfaces. It also uses other new features of
Actionscript 2 such as packages, strict typing and exception handling.


What AS2Unit Is Not
-------------------
AS2Unit does not help in the testing of any timeline Actionscript code, nor
in the testing of any on-stage features. AS2Unit is designed for testing
Actionscript 2 classes only.


What Next?
----------
A website will be created to allow you to download the framework, once
released. The site will also contains links to unit testing documentation
and articles. The URL will be www.as2unit.org. AS2Unit will be covered under
an open-source licence and we will create a project on SourceForge.

The team at iteration::two will be writing some columns detailing the
challenges that arose in the development of AS2Unit using Actionscript 2, as
well as articles on the use of AS2Unit, and Object Oriented development
using Actionscript 2.

The initial release is complete and ready to go live as soon as Flash MX
2004 hits the shelves, and we'll welcome contributions to the codebase from
the development community from that point onwards. If there are any features
your would particularly like to see added to AS2Unit prior to its release,
please feel to contact us.

Best regards,

Alistair McLeod
iteration::two

From Indie Rock to Flash Animation

NY Times profiles Matt and Mike Chapman who run the site homestarrunner.com...

Quite a cool site that goes to show that Flash Animation pays...

;)

CHris analyzes the Macromedia Menu Bar

CHris MacGregor of Flazoom has an interesting analysis of the new menus on Macromedia.com.

Quote: "...it is nice to see that Macromedia is paying attention to the way people use their mouse when designing their menu. Notice that when you first mouse over a button you see the listing of sub sections for that portion of the site..."

Is Flash MX 2004 and Royale the same?

I thought they were different, however Marc Canter seems to imply that they are the same...

Does this mark the end of the Flash hacker?

MX 2004 has some real cool features for programmers the biggest one being of course ActionScript 2.0.

Moock is rejoicing that the evil 'prototype' is dead. And of course a lot of programmers are happy that ActionScript just got a wee bit more stricter...

I remember how Flash 4 was a big leap over Flash 3. Ditto Flash 5. And the MX. Now MX 2004. ActionScript and Flash Scripting has been becoming more and more sophisticated over a period of time. So does this mark the end of the road of people like me who started out early with Flash (I did with Flash 1) and then progressed as Flash moved on?

I can't yet call myself a programmer.

I learnt Flash 4 scripting by looking at Lingo. Then I learnt OOP by using Flash 5 and believe it or not I also learnt JavaScript because of Flash. Event based programming became part of my life thanks to Flash MX. But now?

Is it time for the non-programmer type to give up and adopt the simpler version? I think not. I'm going to buy MX 2004 Pro. I've been upgrading myself all these years, looks like I can do with another...

;)

MX2004

Lots happening on Macromedia.com, there was a sneak peek presentation which I missed as I was in a meeting...

But the site is updated already and loads of goodies for you to check out, and even pre-order...

New York blackout pics taken by a Flasher...

John Wehr of the XMLq and Full Browser Layout fame has some nice pictures of the New York Blackout on his site...

This one in particular seems like it's out of Life Magazine...

[via Boing Boing]

Meet Googel

Claus has been working hard on Deng and his latest attempt looks amazing. It's the Googel homepage interface, with the search functioning. That is not Google BTW, it's Googel...

;)

Mumbai Flash User Group

Brajeshwar is stirring things up... Should a great way for Bombay based Flashers to exchange knowledge...

Introduction to OOP in Flash and ActionScript, Part 1

Joey Lott, author of ActionScript Cookbook, has this nice tutorial up on the O'Reilly site...

Adam Bosworth is excited about Macromedia Central

At least, that's what I can tell from this post...

Excerpt:

Macromedia focuses more on the richness of data and on the richness of the interaction with the user than of the widgets per se. Kevin Lynch has a great demo of the forthcoming central which makes the same point. When you see it, you are overwhelmed by how gracefully the media fit into the application and appear to be an integral part of it even as they are being dynamically fetched from the server. I'm excited about the work Macromedia is doing here. I think it is great work and can substantially enrich the web experience. I was also impressed with the Lazslo presentations (which at least when I saw them sat on top of Macromedia's Flash engine) and with Altio which had its own Java rendering engine. In short, I'm not against "Rich UI". Why would I be? I got into this field years and years ago when I fell in love with the Xerox Parc work and set out with partners like Eric Michelman and Andrew Layman to build the first project manager with a graphical user interface. Later Eric and I split off and teamed up with Brad Silverberg to build Reflex, one of the worlds first databases with a graphical user interface. None of this work, of course, used media itself as a type with the dazzling richness and aplomb that the new Macromedia Central demos do. But they shared the excitement and vision.

[via Emergic]

Are people patenting Flash methods and workarounds?

I'm reading High Stakes, No Prisoners by Charles Ferguson which is the story of Frontpage, how the startup came up and then was finally acquired by big bad MS.

Ferguson stresses on the importance of getting patents and stressed that one of the reasons they made an attractive acquisition was because of the number of patents they held. Going through VentureBlog it sems VCs treat patents as a necessary evil. "Get them because everyone else is getting them, but hope you never have to use them..."

I'm not sure what effect such patents would have on Flash development. Imagine if Brandon had patented his ACK engine and such. I think having a certain amount of technology out in the open is necessary for innovation. Patenting just stiffles it...

BTW MS themselves are in trouble over some IE patents...

Scoble is bullish on India

Scoble looks at the rate at which .NET user groups have been growing in India and is pretty certain that it is on it's way to becoming an IT superpower...

I'm not too sure if Flash groups are finding the same kind of response, though. I remember Brajeshwar asking me sometime back about starting one, but then I reckon the interest just died out (or maybe I was not kept in the loop...)

We do need to do something about that...

Tim Bray: Flash versus DHTML user interfaces

Tim Bray talks about his experience about building a Flash based application and then dumping it for a DHTML version...

Clearly Tim talks about Flash here as mostly 'Eye-Candy'. That certainly shouldn't be the primary reason for you to go for Flash as an option for your interface. The other reasons why they went for flash like animation and xml support were quite valid. Though I'm not a big fan of using animation and morphing in applications. People get tired of it very soon...

And the winning flash blog is...

Geoff Bowers didn't yet want to post the Fullasagoog stats page yet as stats for Aug are just coming in, but PeterJoel just couldn't wait to show off ;)

So the top three blogs with maximum click-through are:

• Peter Joel (55 Click avg)


• Daemonite (47)


• Quasimondo (44)

enterFrame was 8th with an average of 36 Clicks

The top three blogs as per the number of posts are:

• JD on MX (157 Wow)


• An architect's view (46)


• enterFrame (45 cool)

So that is not a bad click to post ratio. Thanks for visiting guys...

Macromedia Central looks good.

So Macromedia has apparently allowed beta testers to release MM approved screen shots of the new Macromedia Central, and it sure does look good.

The earlier interface was more Outlook like and had the left panels that listed the applications, but in the new interface it looks like they have shifted the application list to top and are using bigger buttons. This is much much better from a Fitt’s Law point of view as it will allow faster access to the applications. Also there is now a separate console. There are both advantages and disadvantages of having a separate console. The console is good from a space utilization point of view, however when to comes to ‘multiple window handling’ the lesser the better. In fact, I’ve come to love the Firebird tabs a lot and believe dockable tabs makes for much better handling (hope Adobe is not waiting to pounce- presonally I believe patents on UI should be stopped, but that is another post.) But since this is going to be a single console, it might not be such a big issue. The notification indicator is also quite prominent and should work well.

Overall I think this is coming along very well, and I can’t wait to start developing for it…

Building a Flash Paper player

More than two years ago at Wanadu, we were considering building a product similar to Flash paper and I had built an interface and prototype which is still available online here. I could keep adding more features to this player if I wanted to as the source was completely in my control, which may not be possible with the Flash Paper player, and this is probably why we're seeing a lot of interest in people wanting to build their own Flash Paper players (see 'integrating flashpaper' on Flashcoders.)

Now it will be nice if MM could make the player source open or at least provide ActionScript APIs that will allow you to build your own players. I think it would soon become a need for developers...

But apparently the Flash Paper EULA does not allow you to do this. Too bad.

WinBeta looks into Flash 7

WinBeta.org has this to say about the next version of Flash...

Disclaimer: This site is not responsible for the contents on the sites it links to.

Should Macromedia standardize a markup for Flash?

Was going though JABBy Panda's list of Flash Markups and realized that there have been just too many attempts. Add to the list XML formats for Flash engines like Laszlo and the list would go on (in fact at Wanadu we were thinking of developing our own at one time.)

It makes me think that maybe Macromedia should provide a standard markup for all Flash based content conversion engines. And who knows, maybe even offer the next version of Flash as a web-service.

Now that is a thought...

;)

Open Source Comm. Server

Oregano is a new Multiuser Server for building Flash based multiuser sites and games...

See it on action here...

Usability Heuristics for Rich Internet Applications

A very interesting article on boxes and arrows:

Extract:

“The key difference between a typical Flash site and an RIA is that RIAs possess the functionality to interact with and manipulate data, rather than simply visualize or present it.”

PDF unfit for human consumption?

Jacob Nielsen seems to thinks so...

Extract:
Users get lost inside PDF files, which are typically big, linear text blobs that are optimized for print and unpleasant to read and navigate online. PDF is good for printing, but that's it. Don't use it for online presentation.

First it was Flash, now Nielsen turns his attention on to PDF. I wonder what he will have to say about Flash Paper, which is sorta like PDF in Flash

[via Dan Gillmor]

Macromedia does an affiliate program

Found this on Mike Chambers'...

For more info check the Macromedia site...

Adobe launches SVG Viewer 6

Is SVG play catch-ups with Flash?

[via zoode]

Breeze Live v iConference

I wonder how different the Breeze Live product is from the old Wanadu iConference. Doesn't look too different...

Now it looks like iConference has been integrated into the MeetingPlace product suite...

A group is its own worst enemy

Reading Clay Shirky's article titled A Group is its Own Worst Enemy got a lot of mental threads running. This is an excellent look at Group Software and Behavioral Patterns that emerge from its usage. It's a long read, but worth it, especially if you're developing FlashComm applications...

[quote] We've had things like mailing lists and BBSes for a long time, and more recently we've had IM, we've had these various patterns. And now, all of a sudden, these things are popping up. We've gotten weblogs and wikis, and I think, even more importantly, we're getting platform stuff. We're getting RSS. We're getting shared Flash objects. We're getting ways to quickly build on top of some infrastructure we can take for granted, that lets us try new things very rapidly. [/quote]

[via Joel on Software]

Google Autofill and Flash Forms

Before anybody says that Flash is unusable because the Google Bar BETA's Autofill feature (see image below) will not work with it, here is an ugly hack...

Please, please ignore the JavaScript errors, and this may or may not work on all browsers. In any case if anybody feels this is a useful hack or something better can be made out of it, feel free to download it...

The "AutoFill" feature btw is kinda nice and scary at the same time. You can even store your Credit Card info there. Not something I'm going to use, even though it is password protected...

BTW, this only works the first time you do use AutoFill, I have not coded it so that it will work when you reset the form, I'm too tired right now. It's kinda late here in India ;)

FListBox tutorial

philterblog has a comprehensive tutorial on the FListBox Flash UI Component...

CF_Europe Presentations

Here's a list of presentations that were made at CF_Europe They all look very nice. But I liked Aral Balkan's presentation on Understanding "The Other": Roles, Process and Architecture for RIAs a lot

[via Peter Hall]

Who is Margaret Carlson

Got an email today from Margaret Carlson that went like this:

Wonderful. I look forward to it.

Margaret

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Margaret Carlson
Flashforward New York City, Jul

Seems like a lot of other people on Flashcoders got it too. Now that is contextual spamming at its best!

Requirements gathering using blogs...

Mike Chambers has a post on his blog asking Flashers to describe their dream ActionScript Editor. While this is a good community exercise, this would be an excellent way to get ideas for the next version of the product. I'm not sure how Macromedia is going to use the information, but most product managers when the look at all the feature sets asked for by the users staring at them like this, would feel inclined to use at least 50% of them...

Let's take for example, take the ability to enhance the commenting feature. Here are some of the responses (most describe the functioning of the users' favorite software):

• the ability to select several lines of code and with one button comment those lines (even if the lines are already commented). This is a feature that Directo
• Ability to easy add JavaDoc style comments
• Ability to parse JavaDoc comments into XML for component packaging
• ability to hide/show comments
• to be able to place customizable bookmarks in the margins that link to external files with comments
• block commenting, code hinting for user defined functions, code templates (like homesite) for custom blocks of code you use all the time
• inbuilt commenting/doc engine
• collapsable functions and comments
• way to view a function and it's comments, without leaving the call on the function
• Multi-line commenting (ala director)
• XML style code commenting ... like in C Sharp
• the ability to insert embedded swfs (or flas) into the code comments
• the ability to define regions of code that comments belong to
• post a comment using your mobile phone

Now enter the product manager, who looks at all this set of features that are sitting in front of him/her and wondering "Wow! This is how I will be able to deliver a user centered product with all the features the users want"

However, this is NOT user centered design. Ask a user to describe their dream product and you'll get all sorts of answers. You can't add all these functionalities!

Now I'm not suggesting that the Product Managers at MM are planning to go this route, but in a smaller software company like mine, this is a great risk.

In fact, the next step at this point would be to accertain why the particular requests are coming up in the first place. What is the motivation? In this case I see only two:

• The need to make code managable
• The need to make documentation out of comments

You can solve the above goals either by giving an excellent (read bloated) commenting feature or you could use this information to think outside the box and come up with an innovative way to make the code more managable.

I wonder which way Macromedia will go...

Authorware 7

Macromedia has just announced the release of Authorware 7. While Authorware has a huge following in the eLearning community, Flash has lately been catching up and I see a lot of eLearning material in Flash and even a lot of job opportunities. I wonder in that case is this just a release for those few who just don't want to change from Authorware to Flash because they find it too complicated? If so Macromedia should consider releaseing a FlashLight which could be a bit like the Photoshop Elements version of Flash.

Also, I wonder why they are not calling it Authorware MX?

[via JD on MX]

How important is this post to you?

MXNA has started a cool new feature whereby it ranks posts on the basis of number of clicks it receives. If you use MXNA a lot that is a good way to quickly find out if the post is relevant to other flashers (as there could be number of 'OT' posts on flash blogs). Now a sort by ranking feature might be useful as some important posts might have been pushed to the end when you visit the site. What say?

Flink.be

Found this site for a Belgium based design studio with some nice pixel animation. The design is good, but the site navigation is highly un-usable. The spider like navigation has a mind of its own and keeps moving... Very frustrating.

But that apart there is some really good work displayed in their portfolio. Especially the information design work for Agfa. I wanted to see an enlarged version of those. It looked very nice...

[via k10k]

OpenOffice to support Flash Export

I might be a little late on this one, but the latest version of OpenOffice (1.1 beta2) seems to have support for both Flash and PDF export. That is cool...

Also on a related note, Microsoft which is already feeling some pressure on the MS Office front has announced a price cut on volume licensing of their yet to be relased version of Office 2003...

Sean Neville on RIAs

There are a number of reasons to use Flash for rich internet application development, but one of the most compelling reasons, is the ability to deliver not just cross platform, but even cross-device applications.

This Sean Neville interview on the serverside talks about RIA development using Flash. Here is an excerpt:

Yes Flash does work on a number of devices and PDAs and there's more in the works. It's a very important piece of our strategy so there are a lot of exciting things happening there. In a world in which the same pieces of data need to be exchanged between applications that reside on multiple devices, whether it's potentially sharing data with my PDA, my iPod, my TiVo, my laptop, my desktop, the server that you use, you know I need to be able to share a lot of data with a lot of different devices in my own personal world. So if Flash is going to be one of the leading application client containers for replicating that sort of data, then it needs to run on those devices.

The closest anything gets to this is Java. But I'm not sure how easy or difficult it is to port the same code across devices...

[via Christian Cantrell]

Flash Form Submissions...

This is a post on Moock's Blog about the quirks of using Flash UI Component based forms. The article on the O'Reilly site discusses this in more detail...

Maybe a Flash Form component should be developed based on these guidelines...

Flazoom is 3 years old

Time flies. It seems like just yesterday that I had posted my first review on Flazoom, today three years have gone by...

According to CHris' post there have been around 1800 posts on Flazoom, of which a mere 60 odd have been posted by me. So that goes to show the great variety and enthusiasm amongst the rest of the editors.

Although very few editors still post there (many might have got their own blogs like me) CHris still updates the site regularly and it makes very good reading...

DENG Browser is out

Found this on Claus' Blog. Looks like the beta for DENG browser is out. Here's what Claus has to say:

Today we put the first public beta version of the DENG Browser online.

The DENG Browser is a desktop application based on the upcoming DENG Flash MX Component, looking, feeling and behaving just like your favourite Web Browser (Mozilla, Internet Explorer, ..)

You may ask yourself why we would write a Web Browser, as there are already quite some good implementations out there. There are several reasons:

First, this software is not meant to replace your favourite HTML Browser, nor is it supposed to replace Flash or anything else. Flash currently is way too slow for being able to compete with C++ implementations. We developed the browser to give the beta testers of the DENG Component the ability to test their documents in an easy way, without having to touch the Flash IDE. We think that the DENG Browser is of interest for a much broader audience so we decided to make it public.

Another reason, and thats the main reason we developed the DENG Component, is missing support for emerging Web Standards like XForms in current browser implementations. The final version of DENG (we are hopefully going to release it in summer/fall this year) will feature support for XHTML Tiny, XForms, XFrames and Mobile SVG, all styled by CSS2 (plus some CSS3 features) amongst many others, with a strong focus on XForms. Currently, it supports subsets of all those technologies, growing every day.

Last but not least, DENG is a zero-install rendering engine based on Macromedia Flash technology, allowing very fast development cycles (for an experienced Actionscript developer, it is very easy to write new Namespace Modules) and support for rich content.

Download the browser...

Friends of Ed is Alive

Friends of Ed, the Flash books publisher which had to go under because its parent company had shut down, has re-surfaced.

Apress has has bought them over...

This is good news for a lot of people who have had projects shelved because of the shut-down. Hope they all get revived and we get more books on Flash...

[via Flashcoders]

Humane Interfaces and Flash

I got on to Emmanuel's site via a comment he posted here and found this post...

The paper there makes for very interesting reading...

The Essential Difference

Do you Systemize or Empathize?

Take the two Flash based tests to find out what your Essential Difference is...

I seemed to score pretty high on both...

EQ= 52
SQ= 42

That classifies me as B Type brain. Hmnn..

Meet Jeremy Allaire

This Meet-the Makers interview with Jeremy Allaire makes a very nice read. Some very intersting thoughts on his vision of the future...

One of the points he makes is the eminent death of the browser. With Office 11 and InfoPath looking like Microsoft's steps in that direction, I really wonder whether the next generation of software will be nothing more than an extended client-server model. Where the client is a web-veneered Office based Application and the server residing somewhere else over the Internet...

One important step taken by Macromedia in this direction is the announcement of Macromedia Central. But it's too early to make predictions yet...

[via Emergic.org]

Flash Color Scheme Generator

A small Flash application that quickly generates a color scheme based on one input color...

Interesting...

Were-here is back

Finally...

Good luck Aaron and Jessica...

Mike Chambers shares some Flash Best Practices

Found this on Mike's Blog today. Mike suggests the following:

• Create a base class contained within a symbol. All events and data flow through this class.
• Create Screen Classes and symbols for each screen. They communicate by broadcasting events.
• Virtually everything is contained within a class, and thus all ActionScript is externalized in external ActionScript files.
• There is no code on the main timeline.
• There is code in multiple symbols

One best practice suggestion on my part would be to use the default code directory, namely "Program Files/Macromedia/Flash MX/configuration/include/" Place all .as files here and maybe even create additional folders inside here, for each project. This way you could move your .fla anywhere and still have access to the scripts...

Matthew Berk on the RIA Development Space

Jupiter Research has quite recently given all analysts personal weblogs where they can blog about the latest happenings in the industry. I think that is a real cool idea.

While on the site, I came across Matthew Berk's weblog. Matthew has been quite bullish about Flash and RIAs in general for a long time. Here is Matthew's look at the RIA space, and not surprisingly Flash figures on top of that list.

...followed closely by Laszlo.

Edward Tufte on Flash

Just came across this thread on Tufte's discussion board. It quite old but it is still getting new posts. Very interesting...

World as blog

Get a ‘God’s eye view' on the world of blogging. The ‘World as a blog’ is a Flash app that scans the world for updates and displays new posts neat little dots, located exactly where the post originated…

How does it do it? As a blogger, there are three things you need to do on your end to make it work: First make your blog geoURL enabled by adding geoTags. Then makes sure you have the RSS tags. And finally make sure you ping weblogs.com every time you post a new entry.

Once you done that, Weblogs.com updates its server up to a minute after you've pinged it, then geo-blog poller checks that, and the flash map finally checks in with the server about once per minute. It could take up to three minutes for your entry to show…

I’ll let you know how long this one took ;)

PowerPoint to Flash conversion

Wanadu, the company I used to work with was recently acquired by Latitude Communications. Which, means iCreate, the PowerPoint to Flash conversion tool will now form a part of MeetingPlace, the Latitude product. There has been no indication as to the future of iConference which is/was a FlashComm based conferencing solution.

There recently has been some interest on this topic even from .Net evangelist, Jesse Ezell. And there are some nice comments about it on his blog.

I’d definitely like to wish the entire Wanadu team the very best. Hope that this new partnership works out well and the 'Richmedia for the rest of us' dream comes true...

Flash file upload component

Once upon a time, there was only a tricky JavaScript workaround to do this. Today, there is a component...

Cool...

(Wish it was built into the Flash Player though...)

Flash in the Can Presentations

Considering that travel is not high on anybody's minds these days, very few people would have had the opportunity to make it to Canada for Flash in the Can.

You might have missed the event, but you need not miss the content. Here are links to some of the presentations made during the event. Thanks to the Toronto Flash users group.

A better preloading API

Colin just started a petition on his blog asking Macromedia to support a better API for preloading MovieClips. Anybody who has tried building pre-loaders will have inevitably run into these issues, so it would be great if Macromedia will be able to fix these issues... right?

MoockBlog

While I'm still waiting for my copy of ASDG2 to arrive, Colin Moock has been busy setting up his new blog. Expect some cool stuff there in the future (he's already busy posting).

Meanwhile you can dig into his SF FF2003 presentation. Excellent place to whet you appetite for Design Patterns and Flash OOP

Flash Image Parser

Ever wanted the Flash HTML text-field to be able to parse an <img> tag? Well, Peter Elst is working on something that can do just that. Check this sample It still has issues with scrolling by selecting the text etc, but this is a great beiginning... good work!

We're still here

Were-here.com is in my opinion one of the best Flash community sites around, but unfortunately they have been facing some issues lately and the site has been down for a while. They recently posted a note on their site saying that they will be back, this post is just to say that I'll be there when they are back...

Macromedia Flash Player 6 for Pocket PC 2002

Yay, yay, yay!!!!!!!!

Need I say more.

More on the Flash Comm Server...

Want to know more about the new Flash Communication Server? Here's a Desdev article on the new features and technical changes...

Macromedia Central and other new products

At the SF FlashForward, Macromedia recently announced the launch of Macromedia Central. From what little I could understand Central is a wrapper for deploying Flash based web-applications on the desktop (SWF studio??). You can make changes on the desktop version in a disconnected mode and they would be updated online the next time you go online. Sounds interesting, I'll post more news as and when I have more...

Also at the FF, they announced the release of Flash Comm Server 1.5. The most noticeable feature was a free developer version ;)

Capturing mouse clicks in Flash

Careating mouse-button bindings are an integral part of developing usable application and generally, the only button Flash gives you control over, is the left mouse button. But there are extensions which allow you to gain access to more mouse-buttons. You can get the code from Layer51 and see it in action here.

Also there is another example that I came across which gives you a few other features as well.

So putting the two together on can have lot more control over the mouse buttons. Now only if macromedia would have allowed us to disable the Flash Player contextual menu completely.

XSLT Magic!

Claus Wahlers of the Deng fame just posted this on his site. It's a way for the browser to display flash files from simple XML files. NO server-side processing.

You can see it in action here and read the explaination here.

Laszlo Presentation Server - A quick review

A few days ago I download the Laszlo Presentation Server (LPS). There had been a lot buzz about this product, which incidentally is only about two weeks old, and as per the email I received from them, has only had a closed developer release as of now. This explained why the download was not available freely on the site. Overall, my user experience with the whole process of getting the server and installing it was really good. The server itself is not too heavy (17 odd MB for the DR version which has Jakarta Tomcat bundled with it) and after I got it installed, I was able to get working with LZX files right away. The help on the site is not yet complete (they do warn you about this) but there is enough information to get you started.

Anybody who has used XML, and JavaScript/ActionScript before should be able to get a handle of LPS pretty easily. There are basic tags that define UI elements like <canvas>, <button>, <text> and <window> which help you build your application and new components or classes can be included (using <include>) easily extending the capabilities of the API.

The scripting language is ECMAscript based and since the definition is XML based, you cannot really use the less than and greater than signs, so all scripts have to be included into a <![CDATA]> tag, very much like SVG in fact. They have included a debug extension with the API so you can debug your application just like you’d use the trace function if Flash. There is no visual IDE, so you’ll have to use EditPlus or whatever your favorite text editor is to write out the code. Also since it’s all XML, you can also use XML spy to write out the code. I used my favorite – TextPad.

The version that I download uses Tomcat as the servelt engine, but I should imagine that it does work with any other Appservers as well.

I have not done any extensive testing on the server so I cannot at the moment comment on the performance and other issues with the server. But here is quick SWOT analysis that might help you:

Strength: There is currently a demand for richer web based applications and a lot of industry experts are touting that Flash would be filling in this need. Laszlo is betting on this increase in Flash based RIAs and hopes it would be seen as a more painless solution since they would not have to deal with complex and animation oriented IDE that Flash presents them with. Moreover the ability to use an normal to text editor to produce Flash applications would definitely strike a chord with the Linux community who have been desperately looking for an IDE for Flash.

Weakness: This is a server-based solution a bit like what Generator used to be. In fact my first though was that this would have been a natural progression for Generator had Macromedia continued the tool. However, Macromedia did not see Generator as a viable tool to continue, would Laszlo be looked upon in a different light? Also Flash is not a standard, if you’re looking at a Standards based Enterprise Web Application development market, it would have been worthwhile to port SVG as an optional delivery platform. On the other hand this is a servlet-based solution while a majority of the Flash development community work with PHP. Would they switch to Laszlo and a Tomcat/J2EE dev environment?

Opportunities: They currently do not have any commercial competition doing exactly the same thing. Macromedia has discontinued Generator and Ming is too obscure right now to be considered as a threat. So they definitely have made the move at the right time (can’t really call this an early move though.) Also there is definitely a move to have an XML based standard for defining the application UI, so using XML was definitely the right way to go.

Threats: There are other client based UI rendering vendors like Altio and Vultus, which do not require the use of a plugin for rendering the UI. Also there is of course, Flash, which has an active and loyal developer community and support from the mother ship for web application developers. Also around the corner are other XML based U definitions like WSUI and XUL, which are slowly getting more attention.

All in all, I do believe Laszlo has come out with an interesting product and anybody developing web applications should certainly download and test-drive the presentation server. However it is just too early to make any predictions. We will have to wait for the market to mature and see who survives.

Cheers
Nav

Laszlo

When a group of talented individual get together to form a software company, the product better be good.

Based on all the stir about Rich User Interfaces it does seem that the web application development community is looking desperately for a richer alternative/supplement to HTML, and will Laszlo we able to provide that? Can't say for sure. The marketing spiel does sound good, but will the product live up to it? Don't know yet. I've asked for an evaluation copy, and will post my comments here once I evaluate it.

Flash API

Need to create some cool effects? Don't want to spend time browsing through math books and figuring out equations? Well, go in for the 'Flash API' ActionScript Library

It has been around for some time but Nacho has just updated it and looks good. Apart from that there is always Layer51 if you wish to go for class extensions.

Cheers
Nav

Deng

This is the much awaited (at least by me) of the Flash based XHTML parser. Technically speaking it is an XML, XHTML, XFORM, XFRAMES parser with support for CSS 2.1. Techno-lingo which when translated means that this parser (which is being developed completely in ActionScript) can consume and hopefully meaningfully display well formatted HTML pages.

The current example on the site is a mere POC (proof of concept) and there is I'm sure much more to come...

Keep tuned to Claus' Blog to whet your DENG appetite

What is Flash?

Want to know? Want to share?

Check out a great new WIKI...

Cheers
Nav

Flash based UML tool

Wanted to design Class diagrams and could not afford Visio? Here's an option. It's web based, free, exports HTML/XML, imports XML and it's executed on our favorite platform: Flash.

gModeler is a Flash based application that has been developed by Grant Skinner of the FlashOS fame. This application too builds on the FlashOS framework and has some excellent features.

I can't wait for more such apps to come up...